Co2 Pipeline Company to Host Informational Meetings This Week

By Benjamin Cox on January 10, 2022 at 3:10pm

A Texas-based company planning an over 1,400 mile carbon-capture pipeline across the listening area will be holding public meetings in Mt. Sterling and Jacksonville this week.

The Heartland Greenway, a project by Navigator CO2 Ventures, LLC, will have a sequestration pipeline would go through Brown, Scott, Morgan and Sangamon counties. A separate line would tap into the system near the Adams-Schuyler counties line, carrying captured carbon dioxide through Henry, Knox, McDonough and Schuyler counties. It would carry carbon dioxide from South Dakota to a sequestration site in Christian County.

To get to the sequestration site, the pipeline would enter Illinois in Hancock County and cut through Brown County, into the northeast corner of Pike County, northern Scott County above Bluffs, into Morgan County and continue north of Chapin across the county, entering Sangamon County southwest of New Berlin.

According to Navigator, at full capacity the pipeline would capture up to 15 million metric tons of Carbon Dioxide from industrial customers and keep it out of the air. Navigator says it’s like taking 3.2 million cars off the road.

Navigator says it began reaching out to landowners in October and will continue the process through February.

A series of information open houses this week opens up at the KC Hall in Mt. Sterling 6-7:30PM Wednesday night and at Hamilton’s in Jacksonville 10-11:30AM on Thursday; and at the Edgewood Golf Club near Auburn 6-7:30PM Thursday. There also will be a virtual meeting from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. Friday. Details are available at heartlandgreenway.com.

The Journal Courier reports the company hopes to begin submitting permit information to the Illinois Commerce Commission in the second quarter of this year. If the permit process and easements run smoothly, construction would begin in 2024. Groups along the pipeline’s possible easement have already said they plan to submit legal and permit challenges for the project.